I ordered a bottle last week. Arrived today, will be trying it tomorrow.
_________________Some of my favorite memories from Childhood are from times I went to the Mai-Kai. I have been a tiki person ever since then.

There’s a huge difference between real fassionola and Pat O’Brien’s mix, which we subsequently dumped down the drain. It’s thicker, richer and has a darker color. It also tastes much less artificial, like a real fruit syrup. The flavor is cherry/raspberry with a hint of orange. If you can find a good fruit syrup that has this same flavor, I would try that. Or use Pat O’Brien’s in a pinch. But I would now recommend using the powdered version and making it twice as strong as suggested on the label.

Or keep checking eBay for Jonathan English's fassionola. It appears to be the real deal.

On 2012-05-18 09:15, arriano wrote:Can someone who's used the fassionola say how the flavor compares to passion fruit syrup? I've been theorizing that fassionola may be to passion fruit syrup as Rose's is to real grenadine.

Check out Mai Tai's first post on page three of this thread.

Quote:

On 2009-07-14 14:32, Mai Tai wrote:...
So, to recap, Fassionola is basically a fruit punch concentrate that doesn't have any passion fruit juice in it.
...

So in a way, yes, Fassionola has no passion fruit in it, just like Rose's has no pomegranate in it.

Hurricane Hayward, on the Atomic Grog blog says this about Fassionola; "The flavor is cherry/raspberry with a hint of orange."

I just received a bottle of the English brand - Yikes! It is extremely concentrated and SWEET.
I made all three of the Atomic Grog recipes using Fassionala and couldn't even finish one drink - they were all just too sweet for my taste. I'm going to have to tinker with the recipes and scale down the "sweetness" and see if I can find a nice balance with the suggested rums. Did I mention SWEET?

_________________I bet you feel more like you do now now than you did when you came in.

As pointed out, this is sweet stuff. Makes sense that it's mainly used in very sweet drinks.

I've got a theory that perhaps it was also used as a coloring agent to make drinks look pretty, as opposed to being a crucial flavor ingredient. The color is just as concentrated as the flavor.

That could also explain why it was left out of old recipes that have been recently revived. With many drinks now served in Tiki mugs, it's just not that crucial, unless you're a professional bar that needs very attractive looking drinks. The only one so far that I think really benefits from the flavor is the Cobra Kiss.

Another theory is that The Mai-Kai doesn't use Fassionola straight out of the bottle. My guess is it's combined with a few other things into a proprietary mix. There's something in old recipes called "No. 7" that remains a mystery.